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Updated: July 11, 2025
"What is it, sir?" he asked, at once resuming his status as a servant after a splendid hiatus of five hours or more in which he had enjoyed all of the by-products of equality. "Poopendyke!" I exclaimed, aghast. "I have just thought of him. The poor devil has been waiting for us three miles up the river since midnight! What do you think of that I" "No such luck, sir," said he, grumpily. "Luck!
"May I interrupt you for a moment, Mr. Smart?" he inquired, as he squinted at me through his ugly bone-rimmed glasses. "Come here, Poopendyke," I commanded in low, excited tones. He hesitated. "You won't fall off," I said sharply. Although the window is at least nine feet high, Poopendyke stooped as he came through. He always does it, no matter how tall the door. It is a life-long habit with him.
And those rascally beggars presumed to think that I was in love with a selfish, self-centred, spoiled creature like that! Rubbish! I am afraid that Poopendyke found me in a particularly irascible frame of mind the next morning. I know that Britton did. I thought better of my determination to discharge Britton.
"You may be quite sure, Countess, that I shall dismiss Mr. Poopendyke the instant you apply for his job." "And I shall most cheerfully abdicate," said he. Silly ass! I couldn't help thinking how infinitely more attractive and perilous she would be as a typist than the excellent young woman who had married the jeweller's clerk, and what an improvement on Poopendyke!
"Whew!" said Poopendyke, dropping wearily upon my doorstep which, by the way, happens to be a rough hewn slab some ten feet square surmounted by a portcullis that has every intention of falling down unexpectedly one of these days and creating an earthquake. "Whew!" he repeated.
If we can't unlock the doors, we'll smash 'em in. They're mine, and I'll knock 'em to smithereens if I feel like it." The four Schmicks wrung their hands and shook their heads and, then, repairing to the scullery, growled and grumbled for fully ten minutes before deciding to obey my commands. In the meantime, I related my experience to Poopendyke and Britton.
An atmosphere of gloom settled around Poopendyke and Britton. They eyed me with a sort of pathetic wonder in their faces. As time went on they began to look positively forlorn and unhappy. Once or twice I caught them whispering in the hallway. On seeing me they assumed an air of nonchalance that brought a grim smile to my lips. I was beginning to hate them.
The ancient, being in a placid state of senility, courteously thanked me for my interest, and answered that she had been dead for forty-nine years, come September. I overlooked the slight discrepancy. During the remainder of the day, I insisted on the utmost quiet in our wing of the castle. Poopendyke was obliged to take his typewriter out to the stables, where I dictated scores of letters to him.
They are piling sconces and candelabra and andirons on it, regardless of what Mr. Poopendyke says. You'd better hurry, sir. Here is your collar and necktie " "I don't want 'em. Where the dickens are my trousers?" His face fell. "Being pressed, sir, God forgive me!" "Get out another pair, confound you, Britton. What are we coming to?"
I steadfastly persisted in ignoring the Paris edition of the New York Herald for fear that the delightful mystery might disintegrate, so to speak, before my eyes, or become the commonplace scandal that all the world was enjoying. As it stood now, I had it all to myself that is to say, the mystery. Mr. Poopendyke reads aloud the baseball scores to me, and nothing else.
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